The Dish

Finally, Rudy Giuliani realizes the only path he can credibly take in this primary campaign. He cannot duck from his core convictions that gay people are equal citizens and decent human beings, that women should have a choice over whether to have an abortion in the first trimester, that personal freedom in a multi-cultural society often means living in a society that may not always reflect your own moral values. Nor should Rudy have to duck these issues. His live-and-let live approach to conservatism is essential to a diverse, civil society. It was once the hallmark of a "leave-us-alone" coalition called the Republican party. It is extremely healthy to have a major candidate stand for these things in the current GOP. There are many people open to voting Republican who simply cannot support the religious intolerance, fusion of faith and politics, and anti-gay hysteria that fuels so much of the Christianist base. I fear the Republicans have to lose the next election really badly before they realize how extreme they have become. But Rudy is giving them something of a life-line. Money quote:   

"Where people of good faith, people who are equally decent, equally moral and equally religious, when they come to different conclusions about this, about something so very very personal, I believe you have to respect their viewpoint. You give them a level of choice here."

I disagree with Rudy on his opposition to civil marriage for gay couples…

But he does what no other current candidate has done: positively support an alternative for us under the law. He calls it "domestic partnership," which is what I and my fiance have in DC. It’s not marriage; and its mealy-mouthed rights and responsibilities are a social signal to homosexual citizens that their lives and relationships are worth much less than those of their straight peers. But they’re not nothing. And they at least begin a conversation among Republicans about what exactly to do about gay people and their relationships. What’s staggering about the current field is how none of them even take such a stand – at least with any candor or conviction.

Rudy is also right to reiterate his own long-standing position on gun-control. I am not an opponent of gun rights, but I know many cops who’d like to see better control of guns in the hands of criminals, and the issue has assumed within the GOP an almost theological status as unquestionable doctrine. For Rudy to disown his own experience in this area on NYC would be unconvincing and uninspiring.

My own concerns with Giuliani remain. They have mainly to do with his contempt for civil liberties, his support for torture, and my fear of what damage he would do to the Constitution in the wake of another terror attack. I don’t believe he fully understands the difference between being a mayor and being a president, or has any grasp that the leader of a republic is often celebrated for what he doesn’t do as much as what he does. But this speech in Houston definitely prompted me to take a second look at Rudy. On abortion we now have one clear pro-lifer, one clear pro-choicer, and one person who will say whatever is necessary at any moment to advance his own career. That’s a good trio of choices for Republicans. I’m glad Rudy has added the third choice.

(Photo: Jeff Fusco/Getty.)

The pictures tell you everything: an exuberant, peaceful massive demonstration in a Muslim country for secular democracy. It seems to me that the most important ally the United States now has is Turkey: critical for maintaining the survival of Kurdistan; critical for stemming the tide of Islamism in the Mulism world; pivotal in helping Europe integrate its new Muslim immigrants in the ways of pluralism and secularism. But let’s stop from a moment to look at all these people in the near east, loving democracy, cherishing freedom from theocratic diktats, celebrating the equality of women. Know hope. Freedom is more powerful than fundamentalism. In the long run.

(Photo: People wave national flags as they fill the waterfront during an anti-government rally on May 13, 2007 in Turkey’s western coastal city of Izmir. Thousands of secular Turks gathered in the city of Izmir on Sunday to protest against the Islamist-rooted government in a rally organisers hope will unite the opposition ahead of elections in July. By Burak Kara/Getty Images)

Here’s a glimpse into what happens when a political party tries to coopt religious groups into its political coalition. Before too long, churches are all about pork as well. Money quote:

A New York Times analysis shows that the number of earmarks for religious organizations, while small compared with the overall number, have increased sharply in recent years. From 1989 to January 2007, Congress approved almost 900 earmarks for religious groups, totaling more than $318 million, with more than half of them granted in the Congressional session that included the 2004 presidential election. By contrast, the same analysis showed fewer than 60 earmarks for faith-based groups in the Congressional session that covered 1997 and 1998.

Churches are turned by Rove-style politics into yet another special interest, out for their own money and power. And, yes, the average tax-payer eventually foots the bill – just to grease the wheels of Rove’s corrupt and corrupting machine.

According to vast majorities of Republicans.

The classic:

Vic Gold lets today’s GOP have it – at the CATO Institute, headquarters for the conservative insurgency.

A modest proposal to raise the age of consent for participating in porn movies:

Can a girl of 21 really know what she is consenting to when she signs a release form for a pornographer? Does she really understand what the ramifications might be later in life? That is why I propose that we raise the minimum age of consent to participate in pornography to 65.

I think by 65 a woman has finally attained the maturity necessary to weigh the pros and cons of participating in pornography. Since she will most likely be retired or on the way to retirement by that age, there is little danger that such images will come back to haunt her in her career.

Naples, Florida, dusk. For an interactive gallery of Dish readers’ window views across the world, click here.

"To visit the US at present, as I have done, is to experience an overwhelming sensation of drastic impending change. It’s not merely that President Bush, to whom Blair so disastrously tethered himself, is "in office but not in power". Most Americans can’t wait for him to go, Congress is beyond his control, and the Senate majority leader, Senator Harry Reid, has told him that the war in Iraq is lost – for which statement of the obvious Reid was accused of "defeatism" by the vice-president, Dick Cheney.

Besides that the portents range from Paul Wolfowitz’s travails at the World Bank to the Senate interrogation of Alberto Gonzales, the attorney general, and the trial of Conrad Black. This might sound like the "succession of small disasters, oh trifling in themselves", in Alan Bennett’s Forty Years On ("a Foreign Secretary’s sudden attack of dysentery at the funeral of George V, an American ambassador found strangled in his own gym-slip…") And yet there really is an observable pattern.

Along with the collapse of Bush’s authority, all these episodes are connected to the great disaster in Iraq. And all illustrate the hubristic, impenitent arrogance of the people who have been guiding America’s destiny – as well as ours, alas – for the past six years. What one senses so acutely are the conditions building for a political perfect storm, which will engulf and destroy the whole neoconservative project," – Geoffrey Wheatcroft, the Guardian.

Lou Dobbs and Mickey Kaus will get the heebie-jeebies, but Univision is using its massive media clout to get eligible Hispanic immigrants to get citizenship and get registered. Money WSJ quote:

The citizenship drive began in January, when Univision’s largest station — Los Angeles’s KMEX 34 — began bombarding Southern California airwaves with a campaign designed to steer eligible viewers to become U.S. citizens.

The impact was immediate: In Los Angeles and surrounding counties, the number of citizenship applications filed to the U.S. government more than doubled for the three months ended March 2007 compared with the same period last year. It typically takes six or seven months for green-card holders to complete the citizenship process.

Now, the campaign is spreading quickly to big cities including Miami, Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and Phoenix. After the yearlong campaign is complete, a second phase is slated for 2008 that will focus on getting the new citizens to register to vote.

"I have never seen anything like it in my career. It’s big," said Jane Arellano, a 39-year veteran of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services who is district director in L.A.

If a strongly anti-illegal candidate wins the Republican nomination, and if he alienates many Latino voters, the 2008 momentum for the Democrats could get stronger.